Uconn

Notre Dame's Skylar Diggins center emerges from a team huddle of Connecticut's Stefanie Dolson (31) and Connecticut's Breanna Stewart (30) after a whistle in first half of an NCAA college basketball game in the final of the Big East Conference women's tournament in Hartford, Conn., Tuesday, March 12, 2013. (AP Photo/Jessica Hill)

STORRS — The path to a potential record-breaking sixth straight NCAA Tournament Final Four appearance for the UConn women's basketball team was announced Monday with no real surprises or worrisome roadblocks provided by the selection committee.

Predictably, No. 3-ranked UConn (29-4) received a No. 1 seed for the seventh consecutive season and for the 16th time overall, and earned top billing in the Bridgeport Regional to be played at the Webster Bank Arena at Harbor Yard on Saturday March 30 and Monday, April 1.

The Huskies will begin play this Saturday at Gampel Pavilion with a 1:30 p.m. first-round game against No. 16 seeded Idaho (17-15, Western Athletic Conference champion) with the winner advancing to Monday's second-round action in Storrs for a 7 p.m. game.

The other two teams at the Storrs subregional are No. 8 seeded Vanderbilt (20-11 record, SEC) and No. 9-seeded St. Joseph's (23-8, Atlantic 10 champion).

In order to advance to their 14th Final Four in program history, the Huskies will also have to win two more games in Bridgeport. The other top seeds in the region are No. 2-seed Kentucky (27-5), No. 3 North Carolina (28-6) and No. 4 Maryland (24-7).

UConn beat Kentucky, 80-65, in the regional final last season.

This is the third time in UConn history that they Huskies will not have to play a tournament game outside of the state to get to the Final Four. The other two years that happened were 1995 and 2004, and each time the Huskies went on to win the national championship.

Kaleena Mosqueda-Lewis said it is

See UCONN, Page 5C

very realistic to believe UConn will win the national championship this year even though the Huskies are coming off a tough loss to Notre Dame.

"We learned from it, and I feel like our team has a lot of confidence now," Mosqueda-Lewis said. "Before people said, 'It seemed like Notre Dame has UConn's number. Notre Dame knows they are better than UConn.' At this point, we know that we are better than any team that we play. We know if we are at our best when our guards are playing strong and aggressive and when our post players are doing the same, then we are unbeatable."

The other three No. 1 seeds in the tournament are Baylor (32-1), Notre Dame (31-1) and Stanford (31-2). UConn was the lone top seed not to earn direct entry into the tournament by winning its conference as the Huskies had to rely upon being given an at-large bid.

UConn coach Geno Auriemma said it doesn't bother him that Baylor and Notre Dame are getting all the attention, because they deserve it.

"I'm not like, 'Let's lock the doors and put that chip on our shoulder,'" Auriemma said. "That is for people who have never been there and never done that. We have been there, and we have done that. We know what it feels like."

Last year marked only the second time in tournament history that all four No. 1 seeds advanced to the Final Four, as Baylor, Notre Dame, UConn and Stanford all made it through unscathed. The only other time was in 1989.

There has been only one occasion in tournament history in which the same four teams have advanced to the Final Four in back-to-back seasons. That occurred in 1995 and 1996 when UConn, Tennessee, Georgia and Stanford all made consecutive trips.

If the Huskies make it to the Final Four again this year, they will break the NCAA record of five straight appearances that they currently hold with Stanford and LSU.

UConn has also qualified for the NCAA Tournament for 25 consecutive seasons, the third-longest streak in tournament history. The only two teams that have gone to more tournaments in a row are Tennessee (32) and Stanford (26), both of whom qualified this year, as well.

Auriemma said he takes an awful lot of pride in the consistency of the high level of success the Huskies have been able to maintain.

"That is why I get a big kick out of when you have that mentality of what have you done for us last week or what are you going to do for us next week," Auriemma said. "When you see how many teams have won national championships in the last 20 years and have never been back to the Final Four or have never had any kind of success even remotely close to that. So you do take a tremendous amount of pride in the fact that it has been a consistent run for us, and hopefully it will continue."

In the Huskies 15 previous trips to the tournament as a No. 1 seed, they have won six national championships and advanced to the Final Four five other times.

There are some interesting stories in UConn's bracket.

One of St. Joe's leading players is Ashley Prim, a 5-7 senior guard from Ansonia who played her high school basketball at Kolbe Cathedral. Former Huskies' No. 1 recruit Elena Della Donne, who enrolled at UConn but left after her second day on campus, plays for No. 6-seed Delaware. Also, UConn transfer Samarie Walker leads Kentucky in rebounding (8.8) and steals (66), and No. 14 seed Albany could advance to Bridgeport with Torrington's Sarah Royals playing a key role.

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